Link Love (15/01/2013)

Thought-provoking

“Women are socialized to make men feel good. We’re socialized to “let you down easy.” We’re not socialized to say a clear and direct “no.” We’re socialized to speak in hints and boost egos and let people save face. People who don’t respect the social contract (rapists, predators, assholes, pickup artists) are good at taking advantage of this. “No” is something we have to learn. “No” is something we have to earn. In fact, I’d argue that the ability to just say “no” to something, without further comment, apology, explanation, guilt, or thinking about it is one of the great rites of passage in growing up, and when you start saying it and saying it regularly the world often pushes back. And calls you names.” The art of “no.” – Captain Awkward

“Soon after the heavy romancing, or sometimes alternating with, predators also mess with your self-esteem. They criticize you, your activities, you friends and family, again often starting small and then escalating. This serves to make you doubt yourself (maybe more than you do already) your choices, and to isolate you from support systems.” How to Avoid an Abuser: Understanding Grooming – Dr. Kathleen Young: Treating Trauma

Religion

Equality

“Because that’s really what’s going on here, isn’t it? When women step outside of their “places,” these men argue, it’s only natural that they should be raped. Rape is the consequence for women deigning to think that they can be equal to men. The way to prevent rape, they argue, is for women to stay safely under their fathers’ or husbands’ authorities, dressing and behaving in a prescribed fashion and not seeking to be equal to men. As I said before, the threat of rape is a cultural tool used to control women.” The Patriarchal Utility of the Threat of Rape – Love, Joy, Feminism

“This all aids in creating an environment where a young boy feels comfortable and confident in making jokes about somebody being raped. This boy isn’t “too young to understand the seriousness of this situation.” You’re never too young to understand violating another person is wrong, and if you somehow made it to 16-years-old without that knowledge, that is symptomatic of a larger societal problem that excuses or normalizes behavior like that. When people are afraid to stand up for a 16-year-old gang rape victim because of the posterity of their high school football team? We should be shouting at the top of our lungs for things to change.” The Soapbox: On Steubenville High School & Teaching Boys Not to Rape – The Frisky

“If you’ve done everything you could to be respectful – respected her boundaries, avoided staring, avoided catcalling – you’re on the right track. But don’t expect women to fall at your feet just because you were respectful. Respect is a basic human right. Showing respect to someone else doesn’t automatically get you brownie points in the dating world, and you may still get rejected even if you’ve been respectful. Does this mean women hate guys who treat them with respect? Nope. It just means that women do not owe romantic attraction to everyone who treats them like a human being.” The Feminist Guide to Non-Creepy Flirting – Everyday Feminism

Health

“This week Dr Oz wrote an article for Time that implied that those who actively question the quality of supermarket food are simply food snobs who are seeking an elevated status based on the purity and sophistication of their food choices. This article contained a sneer, but this one was for people working hard to get better food for their families and not for poor folks. The article implied that the only reason anyone would buy clean, real, organic food is so they can be seen to be the kind of people who can afford to completely avoid supermarket food. Everyone, and I do mean everyone, is waking up to the fact that ordinary, processed supermarket food is not wholesome or good. And increasingly it is being seen as poor peoples food. And people are getting mad. The issue is that not everyone can eat as much clean wholesome food as some are able to do. This is an issue of economics and ultimately has little to do with snobbery … that’s just a red herring.” Dr. Oz and Poor Peoples Food – Granny’s Vital Vittles

Beauty & Body Image

“From the time we’re little girls, we’re taught that if we were prettier everything in our lives would be better. We would have the things that we want. Girls become preoccupied with their appearances in an effort to control and improve their lives, and are too often driven to despair when they don’t see themselves as fitting into restrictive and seemingly arbitrary beauty standards. And this is not some dramatic interpretation—it’s just life. Some of us escape unscathed, and some of us are blissfully oblivious enough, and some of us recover from middle school and go on to not care very much, and some of us continue to be chased by the howling, hungry beauty demons into our adulthood and even until we die.” You Are Pretty Enough to Find Love – Eat the Damn Cake

“It’s imbedded in us to think of girls one way and boys the other. And not only that, but we’re also constantly telling girls what we think of their looks. In fact, it’s often the first thing a young girl will hear when she meets someone new. It’s meant innocently, of course, but it sets girls up to expect attention based on their appearance and, in turn, they are conditioned to spend more time and energy on making sure their appearance is attention-worthy.
The result is that girls often grow up into women with an unbalanced idea of how much their looks matter.” Why I Will Never Tell My Niece She’s Pretty – Role / Reboot

Although I’m not sure I want kids yet, and being only 25, I don’t think that’s a step I would take. I know it helps a lot of women, but even having a hysterectomy is no guarantee that it’ll solve the issue, as 25% of women continue to suffer from endo pains and symptoms.